American movies and music often feature xenocentrism in many countries that love their culture.
Xenocentrism is the tendency that consists of privileging the ideas, customs and creations of a culture that is not one's own . This is the opposite of ethnocentrism , which involves placing one's culture in a position of superiority over the rest.
Reasons for xenocentrism
There are various reasons that promote xenocentrism. Sometimes it appears as a way of rebelling against society , when the person chooses the cultural manifestations of a foreign community as an opposition. Xenocentrism can also be due to political reasons or family roots .
There are those who point to countries whose products and customs are imposed abroad as "invaders", but the responsibility lies with those who decide to adopt the external over the internal. The most common examples of xenocentrism have the United States as a country of reference : its films, its television series, its prominent characters in music and acting, and even its politicians tend to receive much more attention in different countries than their own. A news story about the American president usually generates greater interest than one about the president himself.
We can ask ourselves how we got to this point, what this country has done to place itself above so many others. With respect to cinema and music, we could argue that the United States is one of the countries that relies most on its national products , both for its internal dissemination and in the rest of the world. However, the fact that others prefer their products is not solely their merit, much less their responsibility, but in any case it will be due to a lack of appreciation on the part of the latter.
Be that as it may, the enchantment that certain countries generate abroad is an undeniable and very interesting phenomenon from a sociological point of view.
everyday examples
It is possible to detect xenocentrism in those consumers who choose foreign products instead of those made in their country. Even when local goods are better in terms of functionality and quality or more convenient in terms of price, xenocentrism leads to preferring foreign items.
Suppose a man chooses to buy imported fruits . He doesn't care that, just a few kilometers from his house, there are local producers. Although you can buy the same fruit cheaper, xenocentrism pushes you to look for food from another country.
Another example of xenocentrism appears in a woman who only watches Hollywood movies , since she thinks the rest are boring. Even though there are films from other places that are a box office and critical success, she is not willing to give them a chance.
Xenocentrism usually associates the excellence of certain products with certain countries, as is the case with German cars.
The myth of the noble savage
The myth of the noble savage is often used to show how xenocentrism works. This topic is associated with a current of European thought that highlights the supposed benefits of the aboriginal settlers of America, who according to this position lived in harmony and solidarity until the arrival of the ambitious conquerors who took advantage of them.
The relationship between the bases of xenocentrism and this myth can be seen in the lack of information to support the idea that what we do not know, that comes from somewhere else, is better than what is known . This is a basic form of generalization that, depending on the case, may or may not have a negative intention beyond the consequences it causes. Believing that "primitive" human beings did not know evil may seem like a positive idea, but in reality it is as baseless as assuming that foreign products are superior to domestic ones.